Nichia and Seoul Semiconductor, the two LED manufacturers in Japan and South Korea, have respectively reported updates regarding their intellectual property issues with the Taiwan-based company, Everlight.
Nichia has confirmed its YAG patent in Germany as Everlight and its German subsidiary WOFI have withdrawn their appeal in November. The Japanese company then requested Everlight and WOFI to provide the rendering account information for related white LED products. Nichia is going to request compensation for the patent infringement from Everlight based o...

Seoul Semiconductor announced that it won a patent litigation against Everlight in Germany.
The patent involved in this litigation relates to an LED package structure for thermal dissipation. Everlight purchased this patent from a U.S. company in 2017, and subsequently brought a patent lawsuit against Seoul in the Mannheim Court of Germany. In December 2018, the Mannheim Court ruled in favor of Seoul Semiconductor and ordered that Everlight to bear the statutory costs of the court proceeding.
(Image: Seoul Semiconductor)
“Seoul has invested approximat...

Epistar announced that it has achieved a victory in the petitions filed by Lowe’s Home Center with the United States Patent and Trademark Office which challenged the validity of five Epistar patents related to Epistar’s innovative LED filament bulb technology. The five patents are U.S. Patent No. 6,346,771, 7,560,738, 8,492,780, 8,587,020, and 8,791,467.
These five patents are the subject of a pending patent infringement lawsuit brought by Epistar against Lowe’s, filed on April 28, 2017 in the United States District Court. Lowe’s petit...

Taiwanese LED package company Everlight and Japanese LED producer Nichia have continued their dispute regarding the patent of YAG. On October 1st 2018, the Supreme Court of the United State has confirmed the invalidity of Nichia’s assertions about its YAG patents.

The National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) in Japan has announced that the licensing scheme for its comprehensive patent on red phosphor has been changed since October 1, 2018. The red phosphor patent was divided into two groups, a group of materials and manufacturing patents related to the manufacture of phosphors and a group of application patents related to the manufacture of LED devices. NIMS will enter new licensing contracts with companies to which these patents are applicable.

Four Japanese companies, Nichia, Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation (MCC), Citizen and National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), reported that they have been granted in the U.S. the patent (U.S. patent No. 10,072,207) to LEDs using a nitride-type red phosphor*.

Lynk Labs Inc., an OEM component supplier of AC/HV LED and DC LED Lighting assemblies, modules, lamps, drivers and system solutions is expanding its focus on the "LED industry's unlicensed use, import and export of the company's broad and diversified intellectual property portfolio," according to Lynk officials. To support the expansion of this plan, Lynk has formed Lynk IP Asset Management LLC which will have a primary objective of supporting licensees, enforcing IP rights and managing the proper use of Lynks' broad and growing patent portfolio in the LED lighting market.

Tridonic initiated patent lawsuits against telecommunication retailer S-KON eKontor24 GmbH. Although District Court Munich I affirmed Tridonic’s arguments, parties agreed on a settlement for reasons of legal certainty and prompt settlement of the dispute.

For more than 20 years since Epistar’s founding in 1996, Epistar devoted considerable resources in developing its LED technology , and built a sizable patent portfolio around its innovations. To date, Epistar has over 4000 patents and patent applications.

Cree, Inc. , a leading LED supplier, announced that it has reached a confidential settlement in its patent infringement lawsuit with E. Mishan and Sons (“Emson”). Emson has agreed to an exclusive supply agreement to purchase market leading Cree® high power LEDs for its high performance tactical flashlights.

Nichia, the noted Japan-based LED firm, on 29th June filed a lawsuit with the Düsseldorf District Court in Germany against Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer HTC Corp. and e-commerce solution provider Digital River Ireland Ltd., accusing them of the infringement of its LED patent.

Plummeting LED lighting prices and net profits in the LED industry, has allowed LED filaments to emerge as the black horse in the market, placing it under the market spotlight. LED filaments were formerly plagued with manufacturing technology and yield rate issues, and in the past few years Epistar’s patent suits has placed LED filaments under the lime light again.

With judgment dated August 16, 2016 (docket number X ZR 96/14), the German Federal Court of Justice decided that the German part of Nichia’s patent EP 936 682 (DE 697 02 929), i.e. the “YAG patent” is valid. As a consequence, the Federal Court of Justice lifted entirely the first instance judgment of the German Federal Patent Court from 2014 (docket number 2 Ni 11/12) which had found Nichia’s YAG patent invalid and dismissed in total the nullity action initiated by Everlight Electronics Co., Ltd. (“Everlight”).

Nichia announced that the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas has issued a decision holding that Everlight Electronics and Everlight Americas (collectively, “Everlight”) have infringed three Nichia patents. The court upheld patent infringement claims that Nichia filed against Everlight in 2013.

Cree and Epistar have signed a worldwide patent cross-license agreement for LED chips to further advance the growth of the LED lighting and LED bulb markets. Cree and Epistar both hold broad and substantial LED chip patent portfolios that are important for making blue LEDs, the foundation of white LEDs found in most lighting products manufactured worldwide. Under the terms of the agreement, each party receives a license to the other’s nitride LED chip patents and is granted certain rights to non-nitride LED chip patents. Over the term of the agreement, Cree will receive a licensing fee and royalty payments from Epistar.

Over the past year, the LED industry had pondered about the company that would eventually take over Philips lighting component (Philips Lumileds) and automotive business. Go Scale Capital's acquisiton of Lumileds just might be the solution to Chinese manufacturers lack of LED patents, said LEDinside analysts.

Honglitronic announced on Christmas the company’s LED lighting subsidiary, Ledia Lighting’s, patent application was authorized by China’s State Intellectual Property Office, according to a report by Securities Times.

Mature LED applications are driving the industry into a new lighting era, and has opened up a new round of patent strategies. Taiwanese LED manufacturers have invested in technology R&D and patent strategies to acquire a niche in upcoming patent competition.

In response to Nichia’s press release on February 20 related to the U.S. Patent No. 6,653,215, Everlight clarifies that the decision made by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is not final and still appealable. The decision itself has no effect on Everlight’s products. Everlight will appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) against the USPTO’s decision.

Nationstar announced the company’s acquirement of two LED manufacturing patents as well as two district government subsidies for subsidiary Foshan Nationstar Optoelectronics totaling RMB 10.24 million (US $1.7 million) in a report on Dec, 12, 2013.

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